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Development
Objectives The objective of Thare Machi Education, from the outset, has been to communicate basic health information to people who have lost that resource. It should not be underestimated how easily this can happen and how dire the consequences can be, especially when large numbers of a generation become orphaned. In situations where social communication, records and family have been thrown into disarray, seemingly obvious knowledge such as the need for clean water must be re-acquired and implemented. Even the brightest individuals when bereft of a social framework can die while making the necessary observations. Children are, of course, both the hope for the future and the most at risk. This point is made to illustrate that the project is not aimed at telling functioning societies, who know better than anyone, how to live in their environment. The project imparts information 'first-aid' when, for whatever reason, the normal sources of health guidance, have become inadequate or scarce. The project has identified and acted on two main principles to address this need: *That information is best communicated through spoken word in the local language. Minority languages may be poorly supported by media at the best of times and practically unsupported in a crisis. *That the media of delivery needs to be as cheap, accessible and effective as possible. The information itself, of course, also needs to be addressing a genuine need and fit for purpose. Form and Direction The current solution consists of a narrator delivering short interactive audio visual lessons by DVD. The DVD platform was chosen as it is the most available worldwide and, being far beyond development costs, has 'bottomed out' in terms of production cost. Portable DVD players can now be bought in England for around £40 and DVD players in general can often be sourced locally. The input method for the selection of user options is practically universal - the control buttons for Up, Down, Left, Right, Enter and Menu are always available and easily understood. The direction arrows, particularly Up and Down are all that are needed to navigate through the lesson (by answering "Yes" or "No" or selecting the correct answer from two options.) It has been found that the principle of operation is quickly grasped by users who have not seen the technology before and the medium has popular appeal. The process of making the lessons, briefly, begins with a script in English. At the same time a generic DVD is produced that enacts the lesson with a range of culturally familiar presenters. The script is translated into numerous languages which are then recorded by native speakers. Finally the video, audio and control tracks for language specific lessons are edited into a DVD image and written to disk. The disks can be made here and shipped, made near the destination or often simply carried in sets to destinations by peolpe who happen to be travelling that way. In terms of general appeal and wide usage the mobile phone network and hand-held units are now becoming capable of a similar function, with the added advantage of data connectivity. The project is currently exploring the possibilities in this area. The great success of the project so far has been the portability of the lessons. Copies of the lessons have been found by health workers who contact the project only after a local education scheme has been implemented. This kind of locally driven expansion is rare in the field and very encouraging. Technical Workshop External Links